The Greatest Novel Ever Written
by msjgatsby
Summary: Paige takes the first shift after Mike's out of the tub. (PIKE outtake from 3x08)


Author's Note: Sorry! Been out of town having a lovely time. Back now. Here's a quick outtake from last night's episode, because what can I say? I love writing outtake PIKE scenes. Also I had trouble thinking of a title for this, so I just skimmed the story for phrases that popped out, and then I couldn't pass up the chance to name the story this way. I found it too funny for an unedited, written in an hour, one shot I cobbled together.

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Paige sat outside Mike's bathroom door waiting for him to come out. Her leg shook nervously. They'd carefully combed the room for any pills, and there was no way he could escape from there, but she was still nervous.

Her heart still hadn't stopped racing from earlier. She felt like she'd been holding her breathe from the second he went underwater and it still was caught in her chest. He'd told her. He'd told her something was wrong. That his chest felt tight, and she'd ignored him. She told him everything was ok. She assumed what he was saying was just part of the detox process. Hearing Johnny's panicked voice echoing down the hall, seeing them drag him lifeless to that tub makes her own chest feel tight. She'd almost lost him. Again. And once again, it would be all her fault. She should have listened to him when he said something was wrong.

She quickly rises to her feet when the door opens. She rushes to his side to help him limp across the room. He tries to shoo her away, but she desperately needs to feel like she's helping, and he's too weak to fend her off.

"Charlie cleaned up and changed the sheets while you were in there. It should be a little more comfortable now." Paige talks nervously as she helps him move across the room.

"Mmmhmmm." Mike mutters in acknowledgement but uses all of his focus on placing one foot in front of the other. He will not fall. He will not scream out in pain. He will not break down and cry. Not in front of her.

Detox has definitely been no picnic, but it's been hardest on Paige's shifts. On Paige's shifts Mike feels he needs to hold it all in. He hates himself, and hates her seeing this pathetic version of him. Everything hurts, he's shaking and screaming and and sweating and vomiting and having her there to witness it seems like his own version of hell. When she's there, his every focus becomes trying to keep it together in front of her, and his chest tightens up with the pressure of it. Now as he can't even walk the few feet from his bathroom to the bed.

For Paige the walk is too short. With his arm around her shoulder and her pressed against his side, this is the closest they've been in a while. His fever has cooled, but she can still feel the heat of him pressed up against her. The impromptu bath has helped with the smell, and he's changed into fresh, dry clothes. It's almost like things are back to normal. Hopefully soon they will be.

She helps him down gently. He sits on the edge of the bed, grasping his side, and she hands him a glass of water. She's thankful that for the moment he seems to reluctantly be letting her take care of him. Not that he really has a choice.

"Thanks. You're an angel." Mike says as accepts the glass. He takes a sip, glad to be drinking it and not drowning in it.

"Yeah, the ugliest angel you had ever seen." She can't help the biting response. She didn't mean for it to come out that bitter. She was trying to keep things light hearted. He was going through detox for gods sake. He has more important things to think about. He shouldn't be worrying about her hurt feelings. It's not like he's in control of anything he says, anyways. He didn't mean it. She was being stupid.

Mike looks up at her from behind the glass and arches an eyebrow as he tries to make the connection in his brain. He continues drinking as an excuse buy him a moment to take in her words and then he remembers. What he said when he came out of the tub. He sets the glass down on the nightstand and takes a deep breath.

Paige begins to busy herself with tidying up the usually tidy desk. She's embarrassed by what she says, and doesn't expect an answer from him. After a moment's hesitation, one comes though.

"I didn't see you." Mike says, keeping his eyes focused on the glass.

"What?" She asks, turning around, confused.

"When I came up from the tub, I didn't see you." Mike clarifies.

If his skin wasn't so cold and clammy, he would probably be blushing right now.

He probably shouldn't be saying anything, but he can't let Paige misconstrue for even a minute that Mike might think she's ugly. Mike knows she's over him, and he knows her well enough to know that she probably assumes he's over her too.

He should be. Yet Mike has a sneaking suspicion, that while the scar in his side hurt, the real pain he'd been trying to numb with the drugs had been the loss of her love. The physical pain was nothing compared to the emotional hell he'd been through. That was what he was scared of coming back to. Facing what he'd done. Grieving the loss of their relationship. Moving on. Somehow the drugs had seemed easier than dealing with all the challenges he knew were waiting for him when he came down from his high.

Paige stares down at Mike, who's still sipping his water, even though it's close to gone. The silence stretches between them, as she realizes he didn't even know she was there with him before. He sets down the glass on the nightstand, not looking over at her.

"I was there." Paige says softly, upset that she was out of his line of vision, behind him in the tub. She needs him to know she was there supporting him. That she didn't give up on him. Not this time.

"Why were you there? After everything I've done to you..." Mike asks, but thinks better of it when he sees the lost look on Paige's face as she stares down at him. Deciding to change the subject, he picks up the glass again, swirling the clear liquid at the bottom, and asks, "You must have better things to do. How's it going with the Sarkissians?"

"Johnny thinks I should sleep with Torros." Paige scoffs, and then winces as she realizes what she just said. She doesn't know why she told him that.

"Johnny's a man-whore." Mike says rudely, and Paige smiles at his wording. She won't tell him that's the exact response Briggs had a few days ago.

"I don't know. Maybe I should. It would keep my cover intact. Let me get closer." Paige crosses her arms over her chest. She's speaking practically, but hugging herself subconsciously. Even as she says the words she's not sure if she's really considering it, or if she's just hoping to get some response from Mike.

"You could…" Mike says in an even voice, "But you shouldn't have to."

It wasn't a bad response, but it wasn't exactly what Paige wanted. She's not quite sure what she was hoping for.

"What do you think?" She asks, also trying to keep her voice neutral, but knowing she's treading on dangerous ground.

Mike scoffs with a wry smile that she would care what he thought at this point. He's the junkie recovering from detox. A few days ago he was stealing morphine about to shoot up in a hallway.

Sitting down next to him on the bed, Paige stares down at her feet as she softly rephrases the question, "How would you feel?"

He turns to look at her in surprise.

"How would I feel if I were you, or how would I feel if I were me and it was you…?" Mike lets the question trail off.

"Both." Paige says, bringing her green eyes up to meet his.

"I know you feel responsible for Colby's death, but that wasn't you. That was Briggs. I know you want to take down the Sarkissian's, but you don't need to do this. Not if you don't want to. Especially after everything you went through in Sylmar, Christ, I can't imagine…" Mike stops himself, as his voice begins to build up with too much emotion. Leveling out his tone, he tries to wrap up simply, "You've done more than enough for this case already. Let Briggs clean up his mess. Or Logan. This is not your fight, Paige."

"I mean it's just sex right? It doesn't mean anything…" Paige says looking down at her feet. "People have done worse for a case. Colby was tortured to death and he-"

"It means something, and you shouldn't have to do it." Mike cuts her off sharply. She shouldn't talk herself into this. Somehow Paige dismissing sex as meaningless, feels like a dismissal of their whole relationship, which makes Mike say without meaning to, "I don't want you to do it."

Mike winces as he hears the words in the air. He didn't mean to say that. What he thought of who she slept with didn't matter. Not anymore. He didn't have a right to get possessive. She wasn't his.

"How would you feel? If I slept with him?" Paige asks, knowing she's pushing it beyond the carefully drawn lines they'd made for themselves. This is not her asking professionally. Not anymore.

"It would be none of my business." Mike says, hoping she didn't take the words he said before as a challenge to sleep with the man. Sometimes he thought Paige would do something just to prove Mike wrong.

Paige sighs, realizing the moment is over. A beat passes in silence.

"Well, I guess I better put these back on then." Mike moves his body so he's lying back on the bed he was trying so hard to escape from before. He attaches the one to his ankle but he holds out his wrist to let Paige do the honors. He wants to make sure the cuffs are done right and he doesn't trust himself.

Paige looks at him pityingly, "Do you still think you need those?"

"Better safe than sorry." Mike says, "I feel like the worst has passed, but you never know."

"Ok. You're all set. Need anything else?" She asks, once his cuffs are firmly in place. Her eyes drift towards the door.

"Yeah. I'm going to try to go to sleep. Do you mind staying?" Mike asks, curling up on his side as best he can with his cuffs now in place, "Maybe you could keep reading to me until I'm asleep? What book was that?"

"Anna Karenina." Paige says with a relieved smile, picking up the book from his desk and walking around to the other side of the bed to sit beside him.

"Why that book?" Mike asks as he stares up at her from where he lays.

"It's the greatest novel ever written, and I'm shocked you've never read it." Paige says with authority, settling next to him on the bed with the large book.

"What's it about?" Mike asks skeptically, not even refuting that he'd never attempted to read it.

The woman had seen him throw up and beg for drugs earlier, there was very little pride to be lost in admitting he hadn't read a Russian novel.

"It's a tragic love story about two people who let their love for each other destroy them." Paige finally answers.

"Does it have a happy ending?" Mike asks.

"No." Paige answers honestly.

"Is it worth it?" Mike asks, and he wonders if they're still talking about the book. Every word he's ever exchanged with Paige seems to hold a hidden meaning. Mike can never quite tell what's real. Not when every moment with her feels so strangely poignant.

"Absolutely." She says with a reassuring smile.

He would follow her anywhere.

He would do it all again.

"Start from the beginning. I missed most of it before." Mike says as he can feel the exhaustion taking over his body.

"Do you want me to read it in English or the original Russian?"

"Show off." Mike mutters, nudging her thigh with his elbow lightly and she giggles, opening the book to the first page.

" _Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way…"_ Paige begins to read softly.

Mike can tell straight away why Paige likes this book because the first words fit Graceland perfectly. Yet, as messed up as they may be, Graceland is his family. They'd certainly proved that these last few days.

He glances over his shoulder at the woman reading in a soft soothing tone beside him. Even though this version of being handcuffed in his bed with Paige is nothing like he would have ever imagined, her gentle voice reading kindly beside him feels more intimate than any sexual act they've ever shared. He's still in pain, but for the first time in a long time, the future seems bearable. Possibly even bright.

" _...Every person in the house felt that there was no sense in their living together, and that the stray people brought together by chance in any inn had more in common with one another than they, the members of the family and household…"_ Paige's voice drifts softly through his sleepy thoughts.

If before the tub was hell, this must be heaven, because Mike feels an unsettling peace fall over him as her voice and pure exhaustion begin to carry him off. One by one all his troubled thoughts seem to drop off to the lullaby of her gentle reading.

The cases can wait. This is where he needs to be right now. In bed with her beside him.

Tomorrow he can figure out what to do with the Serrin gas. Tomorrow Paige can deal with Toros... Toros. The thought of Paige considering sleeping with that douche was almost unpleasant enough to drag Mike back to consciousness, but it was a problem for tomorrow.

"I would be jealous as hell." Mike mumbles sleepily into his pillow quiet enough that he's sure the words are absorbed into the soft downy feathers as his eyelashes flutter than still against his cheeks.

As she reads aloud, Paige's lips curve into a small smile.


End file.
